Names and Pines
by peaceandlove23
Summary: A what if tale for the Mystery Trio AU.


[_**This is Gravity Falls Fanfiction, part of the Mystery Trio AU. Gina McGucket is the creation of Hereissomething of Tumblr, Stanley Pines is fanon/created in part with Prettyinpwn. All other characters belong to the GF team and Alex Hirsch.]**_

**I want to say, that if in the slight chance the Stan Twin Theory does become canon in any way shape or form, I do doubt his name will be Stanley, just to be realistic *thoughitcouldgoinwiththeshow'shumor*. However this idea came to me and wouldn't leave, I hope the punchline is worth it!**

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"It can't be bottomless."

His brother threw a rock in, and a full minute later neither men heard the _thud!_ that would have told them it reached the bottom.

Stanley Pines reached into his jacket pocket, pulled out a few coins and flung them into the hole. And still nothing came from the darkness, no sound that showed this pit had an end.

"It's probably really deep."

"Oh, come on!"

"Stanford, a bottomless hole is impossible in itself." Stanley turned around, walking back towards the house. "Are you coming?" He called behind him.

He heard his brother run to catch up. "Impossible." Stanford stepped around him and walked backwards. "I didn't think that word would be in your vocabulary after the past three years."

"Fine, then it's...highly unlikely." The man couldn't help but smirk at his twin's expression.

"That's what I said about that wolf thing last week!" Stanford laughed. "Look, lets get another opinion at least...Fiddlesticks is still downstairs right?"

"Yes." Stanley tried to step around his brother. "In fact, we were in the middle of something, Dumbo." He jumped to his right, but Stanford beat him. He tried his left, and his brother was still in front of him.

"Ya always say that." Stanford's foot hooked around his brother's leg when Stanley tried another attempt at running around him, at it brought the younger by-five-minutes man to the ground.

"Haha!"

Stanley kicked him in the leg, and tried getting up. A strong arm was around his neck within the same minute. Stanford was in better shape than him, well he's always been more athletic than anything.

"Say Uncle!"

"Stan!" He coughed a bit. "I have a peppermint in my mouth!"

"You better spit it out then."

He did.

"Now say Uncle!"

"No!"

"Say, Stanford you're the Strongest Man in the World!"

"Heck no!"

"Say I'm the strongest!"

Stanley declared he never would.

"Do I have to arm wrestle you again Stannie?" A familiar voice boomed behind them.

Stanford turned his head and saw the woman looking over the two Pines boys. Hands on her hips, and red painted lips curved into an amused smile.

"Hey Gina."

"Hi, Gina." Stanley struggled, neck still caught in his brother's arm.

"Need help, Hon?" Without waiting for an answer, she hooked her arms under Stanford's underarms, and lifted the man up and off his brother.

"Hey!"

"You guys are so cute when you start playing." She teased, while releasing the man.

"Yea, yea." Stanford walked ahead to open the door to the house

"What brings you by?" Stanley asked. He pulled two peppermints from his pocket, offering one to her and plopping the other in his mouth.

Gina pulled a brown paper bag from her jacket, walking inside, and put it on the table in the den.

"Business was slow, so I closed the shop early, and thought I'd bring my big tough monster-hunter some lunch. Then I thought, "Stanley's a pretty nice guy, I'll bring him some too." And then I figured, Stanford would feel left out, so I brought him one also."

"Isn't that nice of you." Stanford remarked lightly.

"I'll get him." Stanley walked toward the door that lead downstairs. They had been doing some long put off organizing of notes, and listening to tapes that had been recorded over the last few weeks, and reviewing the photos Fiddleford had taken on the past few hunts.

He was halfway down the stairs, when he got an idea and then raced back up to his brother and Gina. Smiling he asked if she wanted to come down and surprise him surprise him herself.

"You trust me down there?"

"Why wouldn't we?"

"...Last time I went down there was some green thing that had-"

"Eh, we caught him," Stanford cut in. "He can't get out."

"Come on, it'll brighten his day." Stanley urged.

Mrs. McGucket eventually agreed, at both men's insistence and they began the way down to the basement. It had been expanded, and widened in to many things. Part of it a research lab, just nearly outside the entry door at the end of the staircase, left of the elevator, where the third member was working.

Fiddleford H. McGucket was hunched over a large desk, with papers and boxes piled around him as he worked to transcribe the tape that had been recorded some days ago. He didn't hear the three come in, or his wife walking up behind him.

"You need to sit up straighter." Her voice made him jump, but he was smiling when he turned to face her.

"Darling, what are you doing here?" He stepped from the work space and pushed his chair in. "I'm surprised you came back down here after last month." He reached up to give her a soft peck on the cheek. His eyes shifted.

"For a moment I thought you were something else."

"Like what?"

"Probably that weird thing we found a few days ago." Stanford answered, as he and his brother walked towards the couple. "It escaped yesterday, but don't worry about it."

"Yea, that was...bad." The smaller man agreed.

"Well, let's go before it does escape."

"I wouldn't count on it." Stanley followed after them, turning off the tape recorder that had gone on playing. They did usually work upstairs, but so much of the past month's work had been placed down here and neglected.

"Fiddleford and I built a new cage for 'em, reinforced steel and everything."

He stopped. Something had just gone pass him. Didn't it? No, it was the shadows. Still he turned around, and then back towards the group, "Did you see that?"

"What?" Stanford asked.

"Nothing, I guess." He threw one more glance behind him, and then looked up at the ceiling.

"You've been spending way too much time down here. Both of you." Stanford looked at the husband and wife. "Gina if your Fiddles starts getting jittery and talking to himself feel free to blame us."

"I always do."

Something flew in front of them. It was fast, just a blur of black. They waited a moment more. There was a loud screeching from above, and then it flew by them again. Close to ground and up to the ceiling.

"GOOD GOD IT GOT OUT!" A high pitched scream came from the shortest member of the group.

"What did?"

"One of the creatures!" Stanford pulled a flashlight from his jacket, and pointed the beam of light towards the ceiling. "You see it?"

The creature in question was the size of a small dog. The body was crooked, and the bone looked as though it was jutting out from it's skin. Wings of a bat, and a tail that moved slow like a cat's would. It's white, bulbous eyes, stared at them a moment longer, before it screeched again and flew down towards them.

"Duck!"

No one was sure who shouted the command, but they all obeyed. In the same instant heard the ceiling above crumble. Rubble and rock began to fall. The creature screeched again.

Stanley had kept his head down, until the last minute, and saw the creature. It's mouth squirted out some sort of yellow liquid onto to earth that had surrounded the door. It sizzled and steamed, and melted it away. He could hear the rest of the ceiling cave in.

When it was over, he removed his hands from his ears and waited. He hadn't been crushed. His body wasn't trapped under the rubble. His legs weren't crushed.

"Guys?" He stood, and reached out grabbing at the darkness, and called again. "Stanford...?" Still no answer. His hand caught a piece of broken wood and splinters filled his thumb and index finger. He jumped back, and felt something or someone behind him.

"It's me, Stanley."

"Gina? Oh thank god, where's the other two?"

"We're here, Brother."

"Where?" The man felt around in the darkness,stepping this way and that. Suddenly there was a beam of light, revealing his brother and Fiddleford. They had been only a few feet from him.

"We're right here." Stanford waved.

"Why did you let me call out?" He asked.

Stanford shrugged and said he had been making so much noise, he knew they wouldn't loose him.

They were all here, and none impaled or crushed by some measure of a miracle. But the debris had formed a tight space around them, like an enclosed cave.

"Was that the thing that escaped a few days ago?" Gina asked. Her hand firmly holding her husband's, who was breathing a bit too deeply for comfort.

"Yea, Stanford and I found it three days ago on our roof." Stanley replied. When the woman didn't asked he went on, "We heard something on the roof at, well, probably two in the morning. We checked it out and it flew in the house."

"How many monster do you keep down here?"

"Just three, well two, since that one escaped." Stanford answered. "Speaking of, I'd rather not have to eat Nerd and Lil' Nerd." He walked to the thinnest looking side, "So let's get going." He gently moving the looser pieces of rubble, till there was a reasonable hole.

They had to duck a bit to crawl through, Stanford going last, and from the other side they saw a large mountain of rubble and rock. By the flashlight's beam they could make out the support that the creature had, or must have, broken, that cause the cave in.

Stanford whistled at the sight. "That'll be fun to fix."

"You'll find a way." Fiddleford muttered, then asked more worriedly, "There...is a back door, right?"

"Nope."

"WHAT?!"

"Gothcha! Ha, ha! Gullible. Yeah there is, right?"

Stanley confirmed there was indeed another exit from the underground lab, it had been part of the original basement. But given the lab's size, not to mention that that particular exit was so rarely used, it would be a long walk.

"Whelp, let's get a move on." Stanford flipped the flashlight in his hand, and began walking.

"Give that to your brother." Fiddleford commanded.

"Pssh, why?"

"Do you even know the way Stanford?"

"..No." He tossed the torch to his brother, after seeing Fiddleford's expression.

As they went through the lab's turns and, they soon found neither of the other two creatures had escaped. Though the cage that held the bat-like creature...well, the bars had liquefied. Stanley mention the substance he saw come from the creature's mouth. Must be some sort of acid.

Shining the flashlight on the power-box that was on the far end of the wall, he could see a few chewed wires jutting out from twisted metal.

"Now we know why the power's out." Stanley mused, looking at the severed wires. "Shouldn't be too hard to repair, right Fiddledord?"

"Shouldn't be." He stepped next to Stanley. "I think-"

"BOO!" A flush of brown hair and a white shirt caught them from behind, and caused both men to emit high-pitched yelps, and fall back.

"Stan!"

"Ahaha! Haa-Ouch!"

"Be nice." Gina snapped, helping the two men up.

They kept on, for what seemed like an hour. They didn't hear anything of the creature, meaning it had either flown out before the complete cave in, or had been crushed to death.

Stanley lead them to a hallway, that had enough proof it had barely been used, aside from Fiddleford remarking he didn't know it was there. Stanley explained it had been there when they first bought the shack, as he said earlier, and all it lead to was a storm shelter.

Sure enough, the end of the hallway opened to an older cellar. A pair of doors that would lead to the outside on the other end of the room. The handles had chains wrapped over them, completed with a lock. Stanley asked someone to hold the flashlight while he got the key.

He had only six keys on the chain in his pocket. One for the car, one for the house, and one of the other four for the lock. He tried them all.

"Uhhh."

"You don't have the key do you." Fiddleford let out a sigh.

"No."

"Are you sure?" The shorter man stood next to him, Stanford handing him the flashlight.

"I tried them all." Stanley looked to his right and saw his brother's expression. "Look I haven't been down here since we moved in!"

"How do you lose something on your own key chain?!" The other Pines twin snapped.

"I haven't been down here for three years!"

"Why did you even put a lock on it?!"

"Cause we had just moved in and I was worried about break ins!"

"All the way out here?"

"Ya know what? After that first month, when we learned there really are things that hide in dark cellars, I don't think it was so unreasonable to make sure something didn't get in from the outside!"

A sharp whistle broke the argument. "Boys, calm down." Gina crossed her arms. "No use arguing."

Begrudgingly they agreed, Stanley put another peppermint in his mouth, and offered his brother one. Stanford took the peace offering and sat back against the wall.

Anyone else? No? He put the pile back into his jeans pocket and went back to Fiddleford's side. "Let me try again."

He tried for several minutes. He had hopped the lock was jammed from disuse. He tried the other two keys, with Fiddleford holding the flashlight.

Stanford had his head resting on his hand, sitting cross-legged. Sighing loudly he said, "Well, Gina, if two particular nerds didn't take my deck of cards away I'd be willing to show ya a card trick."

"You burnt my eyebrows off." Stanley muttered, still trying his luck.

"You should know better than to stand next to an open flame."

"It was a bunsen burner, and you said "Hey, check it out." and I said: "Not now." And you said, "It'll just take a minute!" And then my eyebrows were gone."

"Says you." Stanford sulked.

Stanley let out a frustrated groan. "I can't get it."

"Let me try." Fiddleford handed the flashlight over. He took a pen from his shirt pocket, and pulled it apart. "I use to do this when I was as old as Ranger." He muttered.

"When's the last time you picked a lock?." Came from a bored voice.

Fiddleford didn't answer, already trying to pick the lock, and bent on his task.

"Guess we'll die down here."

"Shut up Stanford." Stanley said from his place. After a moment, "Wait I thought you could pick a lock..."

"I don't have my kit." He replied."Gina you've been quiet."

"I've been thinking about how Ranger gets out of school at three." She replied.

Fiddleford stopped working for a moment. "Oh no, oh no, I forgot about that!" they could hear him trying to pick the lock more frantically.

"Honey, you don't work well under stress."

"I'm not stressed!" He had a hand to his heart as he said this, then resumed to the task at hand. "I'm just thinking about how...He's...going to come home...and not know where we are!"

Gina looked at the twins in the flashlight's dim glare, and in turn they looked at one another. Stanford was the magician, or whatever he called himself this week. He had to know something that would distract them all from their predicament. At least enough for ther shortest member of the group to calm down long enough to focus.

"I don't have my cards remember."

"You gotta know more than card tricks." Stanley pressured. He could actually hear his friend's frantic heart beat, or thought he could. "Like a joke or something?"

"You guys could finally answer my question." Gina spoke up, her eyes on her husband.

The brothers looked at her oddly, eyebrows raised.

"Remember? When I first met you two. I heard your names, and I remarked there was probably "a story behind that." One of you said there was, and you'd tell me one of these days."

"Oh?" Stanford thought for a moment, his eyes widened. "Ohhh! I remember now. Okay then, storytime. That should calm Nerd-"

"Get on with it."

"Okay!" Stanford began, rubbing his eyes. "Just so you guys know, this is the true story, okay?"

"So, Ma didn't know she was having twins. There weren't twins in her family, or Pop's family. And according to her, and photographs, and relatives, she wasn't showing more than any other woman expecting."

Stanley continued, "The day our parents found out they were expecting, they started picking out names that day. If the baby was gonna be a girl, they agreed on the name Meredith."

"When it came to agreeing on a boy name, that's when they started having trouble." Stanford picked up the narrative. "See, both Ma and Pop liked "Stan", but it was the extension they couldn't agree on. Ma liked "Stanley." she thought it was cute, and Pop liked the name "Stanford." Cause he thought it was classy." He sighed. "Apparently they argued about it, all through her pregnancy."

"You're serious?" Gina asked.

"We kidd not, unfortunately." Stanley added that they had enough Aunts and Uncles to verify, that at least every day, there was a continued disagreement about whether they would name their perhaps son Stanford or Stanley.

"Now, everyday was probably an exaggeration, but it had come up enough times for our Aunts to know not to bring up the subject of names by the time of the baby shower."

"So," The elder Pines twin took over, "they were actually arguing, when her...uh, water broke. On the way to the hospital, they were still arguing about it. During-"

"During?"

"Yeah." Both twins had a light shade of red across their faces by now, though hidden by the shadows of the cellar. Stanford explained their Father was, and still is, a big and mean looking man. Who basically went wherever he wanted. The hospital staff was too intimidated between their Father's presence and their Mother's screaming.

"So he ended up in the room with Ma while she was, er, delivering..."

"Okay." This was said with obvious disbelief, but neither men tried to convince her.

"So, it's revealed they have a healthy, perfect, handsome, wonderful-Ow!" Stanley had moved from Fiddleford's side long enough to elbow his brother, and told him to get on with it.

"Right, so they see they have a boy. They start getting into it even more now, because now they really do have to agree on one or the other. But, then it appears there's another one!" Stanford stated with sarcastic glee.

"So, they said to themselves, "Okay, one can be Stanford and one can be Stanley!" So...The End." Said Stanley Pines finished.

There was silence til the twins in question commanded their listeners to laugh, with the kind of tone that showed they expected such.

And they did. Fiddleford probably the loudest, for what couldn't have been more that a minute or two. He had stepped away from the lock for a moment, and told them they could not possibly give him any sort of grief over his name now.

"Yea, yea." Stanford groan. "We know."

"What do you guys usually tell people?" The shorter scientist turned his attention back to the lock, the story having done it's job, he was calmer. "I mean it that's the true story?"

"That the nurses made a mistake, and one of us was suppose to be Stephen."

"You poor things." Gina muttered, still chuckling. Her hand was wiping the eyes hidden under her black bangs. "Poor, poor things."

"That's right." Stanley chuckled a bit himself. "We are a compromise personified."

"That moment of "Oh, that's convenient!", that's us." Stanford grinned to himself.

They heard a sudden _chgchk!_, and Fiddleford was still. He turned around, beaming and holding the lock in his hand. He had done it.

Without waiting a moment more they removed the chains and kicked open the doors. The October air flooded in and light from the midday sun cast over.

"Oh thank god." Fiddleford muttered, climbing out.

"That was close." Stanley agreed, looking at his watch. "Not even pass three yet."

The screech from before came from behind them, and they ducked. The creature flew out from the dark cellar, and into the woods. They stared for a moment, and then Stanford said he could live with letting that thing remain a mystery. Agreed by all.

"I better start heading into town then." Gina announced, and began walking round the shack to where she had parked. They followed, Stanley suggested they all knock off early.

"Good idea." Fiddleford followed his wife to the car. "I'll see you both tomorrow then."

"See ya!" Stanford called as the car started.

"Have a good one!" Stanley called out.

"You boys take care." Gina replied just as they drove away. "And thanks for the comic relief."

"...We're not gonna live it down are we?"

"No. No we're not."

END

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**Basically a half for fun/half headcanon that I put in story form, that ended up being a longer tale than I thought. **


End file.
